Card Benefits

The Business Platinum® Card from American Express OPEN comes with some valuable travel benefits that can easily make the card worth it for many.

However, it's also vital to note that the card does have a high annual fee which is not waived the first year.

Here's a breakdown of the cards benefits:

$200 Airline Fee Credit

You'll get $200 in statement credits per calendar year when you use your Business Platinum Card to charge incidental fees, such as checked bags, in-flight beverages, change fees are charged from the airline of your choice.

Note that for the charges to qualify you will first need to select an airline of your choice and assign it to your card account.

The $200 travel credit is per calendar year, so you can use the $200 for the current calendar year and again another $200 once the new year starts. This makes it possible to get $400 in travel credit before the second annual fees hits your account.

50% Airline Points Rebate

When you use Membership Rewards Pay with Points for all or part of an eligible fare you'll get 50% of those points back.

The two types of eligible fares include:

First and Business Class tickets with all airlines available with American Express Travel.

Any fare class with your selected qualifying airline.

Global Airport Lounge Access

The card also gives you the benefit of airport lounge access from several different programs. In total you get complimentary access to over 1,000+ airport lounges in 120 countries.

The programs included in the airport lounge access benefit include:

The Centurion® lounge network

The International American Express lounges

Delta Sky Club®

Priority PassTM Select* lounges.

Airspace Lounge

Gogo® and Boingo Internet Access

You also get the benefit of complimentary internet access when you travel. You'll get unlimited Boingo internext access as well as 10 passes to use GoGo internet.

This can come in handy when flying on routes that do not include complimentary internet access.

SPG Gold Status

As a cardmember you'll get automatic SPG Gold elite status as long as you keep your account open. If you don't have any status level with SPG this can be a easy way to earn and keep a lower-tier status.

Complimentary in-room premium internet when you book directly with SPG (in addition to your welcome gift).

Fee Credit for Global Entry or TSA Pre✓

You can get a statement credit every 5 years when you apply for Global Entry ($100) or TSA Pre✔® ($85) using your eligible Business Platinum Card. Having Global Entry can be a nice perk and save time and headaches at the airport by getting you through airport security quicker.

If you frequently travel internationally the best option is Global Entry, because you automatically receive TSA Pre✔.

Who is Eligible for This Offer?

Remember, you can only earn the welcome bonus on American Express cards once per lifetime. This means that you will want to apply for each American Express card when it is at offering an increased offer.

If you have ever had this card before you will not be eligible to earn the welcome bonus. However, if you have any other version of the Amex Platinum card, such as personal cards, etc you will still be able to earn the welcome bonus.

Should You Apply?

The 100,000 Membership Rewards points offer on the Amex Business Platinum Card is a great offer if you have never had this card in the past.

Also, presumably American Express is trying to attract new premium credit card customers to compete with Chase's Sapphire Reserve which has drawn a lot of attention. The bottom line is that the benefits offered from the Sapphire Reserve are hard to beat.

Apart from the lucrative 100,000 point welcome bonus the card does offer some nice perks such as the $200 travel credit, airport lounge access, Global Entry free credit, and so on. However, if you have another premium credit card many of these benefits are redundant.

American Express also recently added the benefit of 1.5x points on purchases of $5,000+ so if you do have a business that makes large purchases this could be a great way to maximize your Membership Rewards points earnings.

Extra tips on how to maximize your rewards

Getting the most out of your credit cards is a must. Compare the current best offers with our Card Maximizer tool or take a look at our picks for the best travel credit cards of 2020. Here are the highlights:

Editorial Disclosure: Opinions, reviews, and recommendations on this site are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed or approved by any bank, card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. You can read our advertiser disclosure here.

Disclaimer: The responses below are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved, or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser’s responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.

This is a nice write-up with lots of details. One question: I applied for and got approved for a Amex Business Platinum Card last month under the regular 40,000 bonus points offer. What is your experience about calling Amex and asking for a bonus adjustment from 40,000 to 100,000 points? Thanks.

worldtraveler2018, there are mixed reports of people successfully (or unsuccessfully) getting Amex to match a higher offer. The best strategy appears seems to be to call in and ask to speak to a supervisor, then once you get them on the line request for an offer match.

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